Anxiety and stress.

Rather a personal subject but as a prelude to reduced posting in 2014 as a bi product of trying to focus more at work, become a road racer and more importantly provide added quality time with my family, I want to get some advice.

I have an anxiety and stress led personality. An recent flip out at work, questions about career direction based on my fraught personality and some family issues have led me to look at others I consider to be laid back simply to the point and generally enjoying life without considerable worry and be envious of that. I'd really like to work on achieving that myself. I'm the type of guy that frets about (well everything) turning the light out after my wife as she leaves a room, or stresses over a missed riding opportunity.

The thing is, it's wearing me out mentally, it causes me to rush through my day and as a result I lose focus on or never achieve individual tasks, am impatient tired and stressed. I need to change it.

Some things I've tried / trying are reading of various books (Steve Peters for example), I do plenty of exercise - 100k plus per week on a bike, walking etc, eat healthy with a treat day built in, I've tried CBT led meditation, alcohol reduction / omission - but it all feels just "wired in" to my head. I also have a Cavendish like ability to either say things at the wrong time or be radically misconstrued, partly due to a very dry SOH and partly an inability to get it right.

My wife says "just chill out a bit" - I wish it was so easy., and sometimes I feel like this is just me and I'll have to live with it.

So what better than to post this on a bike forum full of amateur psychologists.

I sleep on average 11 to 6.30. I go to bed at 10, sometimes read. Yes, I usually wake up approx twice a night and my mind is racing. It takes me 45 mins to an hour to get back to sleep, unless I've been on the beer in which case I sleep through.

"just chill out a bit" is a gross misunderstanding of the situation, I fear.

Have you spoken to a doctor? A good friend of mine was exactly the same, recently started receiving medication and is a different person, their "old self" again. They're kicking themselves for not asking for help earlier.

Not that I'm suggesting that drugs are the only answer or even the first thing to try, but "seek help" is what I'm trying to say.

1) always been
2) everything. Yes, really. For example tonight was/ is my last piss up before quitting for 3 months. My road club then organised a 9am ride tomorrow and I'm in knots about which to proceed with - one affects the other obviously.

Cougar in 2001 I had a massive panic attack at an airport which rendered me unconscious due to the culmination of a "perfect storm" of major life issues. What followed was 6 months of pills (never again thanks) then 6 months of CBT to get me over those issues. I've never been anywhere near that bad since though.

I read a book and it had a profound impact, "the power of now", I didn't read it all but the concept changed my view on what I should be thinking about.

Also remember that the brain is a muscle and if you trained it to have control over your thoughts as much as you train your muscles for sport you'd not have half the problems. My mind used to be as out of control as a feral child.

So some of this is pressure you are directly putting yourself under... You mention CBT-based meditation, but perhaps some counselling directed at your tendency to apply pressure to yourself may be helpful...? If you keep doing this to yourself, there is a chance you may breakdown. It took me 15 years of working under pressure - but finally work-based stress ended up pushing the buttons that led to a crisis for me.

I would suggest taking action sooner rather than later would be best. I left it too long.

It is the trying to get rid of the anxious feeling (and associated symptoms/thoughts) thats maintaining it. How much time do you spend researching it and generally thinking about it, in the hope of stoping it? This is what maintains it in my experience, the resistance to having those feelings of anxiety.

Instead let the feeling be there, including the physical and mental symptoms, without wishing it away and your general nervousness will gradually lower over time. Note you will feel nervous and agitated initially, what you need to practice is leaving this feeling be there and it will reduce and go away over time.

If you get an anxious thought just tell yourself everything usually sorts itself out over time and move away from trying to 'solve' that anxious thought. They are usually meaningless anyway and if you think about it you cannot resolve an anxious thought about a future event as the event hasn't happened, so you're wasting your time. For example "what if the plane I'm going on this weekend crashes?" Trying to resolve this anxious thought is pointless, there may be a small chance of it happening but it highly unlikely. What i'm trying to get across is see it at what it is, an anxious thought, and don't get involved in trying to resolve the thought, dismiss it as an anxious thought and move on with what you are doing in the present time.

Same applies if you feel nervous in certain situations (social anxiety say), let the feeling be there (facing) and don't try to stop it (acceptance).

I see a lot of people fighting their feelings and in most cases it is this resistance that perpetuates those feelings that they are desperate to get rid of. Just accept you have a lot of anxiety at the moment and that you are not going to add more to it by fighting the feelings.

I used to suffer from an anxiety disorder so know what it feels like and its not nice but best of luck. A good read is Dr Clare Weekes or an ebook by ex anxiety sufferer Paul David. But in general try and stay away from reading every book you can on the subject.

I used to be laid-back and relatively care-free. I'm now a lot like you describe. I've analysed why on many occasions and that's a different post for a different day.

In the meantime the thing I found helps more than anything is to be more tunnel-visioned. We're often encouraged to take on multiple projects at once, be they work or personal, and that plate-spinning can definitely lead to stress and anxiety. Recognise that not everything can be done simultaneously, not everything can be done today and not everything can even be done this week/month/year. You get the idea.

I often get anxious at the kids' bedtime, simply because it's the time of day when dinner needs clearing up, kids needing putting to bed, the washing up needs doing and at the same time I'm thinking of what I need to do after I've done all that. Trying to do all at once was not healthy. As a practical example of something that worked for me, even the simple act of washing up is something I now focus 100% on, rather that it being something I'm doing whilst thinking of something else that needs doing. I suppose this is meditation of a sort.

@seosamh I'd prescribe a sensible national drugs policy and an extensive research programme so we actually had a chance of predicting which people would be genuinely helped by weed/ecstasy/mushrooms/lsd and which would flip out altogether and be consigned to the loony bin. Both outcomes are possible.

Sideshow, don't disagree with you at all, though I'd suggest those susceptible to issues would mostly be under 18, not to say dismiss problems after youth though. The research should be done. Still suggest a wee smoke wouldn't go a miss in this case.

Have a look at Mindfulness - that's all about focussing on what's happening right now rather than being dragged off by your racing mind. Plenty of YouTubing about it - Prof Mark Williams and Jon Kabat-Zinn are two leading figures, plus the Headspace site.

I sleep on average 11 to 6.30. I go to bed at 10, sometimes read. Yes, I usually wake up approx twice a night and my mind is racing. It takes me 45 mins to an hour to get back to sleep, unless I've been on the beer in which case I sleep through.

You need to make a change quickly, as that is not enough sleep and you will find yourself in ever decreasing circles.

If this carries on like this you will start to get panic attacks, and could develop into CFS. As your body will just want you to stop. At this point the recovery time will be long and drawn out.

I was in exactly the same position as yourself and i ignored the early warning signs (loss of sleep) and burnt out. It took me 2 years to recover fully, which included months off work and medication. Bike racing takes alot out of you, both pysically and mentally, the mental aspect is not to be underestimated either as the constant worry about ' am i doing enough training? ' or ' im scared im going to loose my gains ' overcomes everything else in your life, which is a bit silly really because in reality nobody looses fitness that quickly, especially if you have been cycling alot in the past.

My advice would be firstly cut right back on alcohol and stop drinking caffine, replace hot drinks with herbal tea which will de-toxify your system. Increase the fruit and veg in your diet. Take two to three weeks OFF the bike completley. Re-evaluate your competition goals, make them realistic bearing in mind you will need to cut back your training. And most importantly talk to people, dont coup things up emotionaly let it all out.

Sorry if any of this seems harsh, but this is coming from experience.

Oh gosh, that sounds tough. From my own personal experience I would say that, for some people, sport actually takes over thus creating stress based around training and performance.

Mine developed into Cfs, lost 2-3yrs of my life and wish I'd done more earlier and seen the warning signs. The good thing here is you are getting some help/advice (although I'd steer clear of weed, tried it and made me worse)

I should add that while Cfs was one of the worst periods of my life, the recovery has been amazing and one of the best experiences ever

Xcracer1 puts it exactly right. It could have been me writing that! - right down to the bit about Dr Claire Weekes.

It's the constant "getting things straight" in your head wrt a particular problem or anxious thought that gives anxiety its cyclic nature.

You really have to do nothing and accept it all. This is incredibly difficult at first but when it clicks it all becomes obvious.
Doesn't mean you'll be "cured" just that you'll cope with your personality much more easily.

You really have to do nothing and accept it all. This is incredibly difficult at first but when it clicks it all becomes obvious.
Doesn't mean you'll be "cured" just that you'll cope with your personality much more easily.

Thats ignoring the root cause and 'trigger' , which wont solve the problem, its merely suppressing part of it short-term.

I used to sort of suffer from similar. My mind used to race and refuse to shut down . I used to call it '100mph head' and once up to speed it took ages to get into a deep comfortable sleep.
I have a much more laid back approach now and really should care more . I drink hot Ribena after work which makes me want to sleep from about 9 ish .
A work colleague once told me of a story about his grandson , who during a non- crisis family crisis stated simply " No -Ones going to die Grandad " . I now use this when its all gone horribly wrong and nothing is working .
I try to get 8 1/2 to 9 hrs sleep a night , which is great recovery time.

I've suffered terribly in the past and got through it with meditation/diet/rest. Still bites and this year has been monumentally hard. We had a 3rd child(unplanned) with lots of difficulties, my wife had a major post natal breakdown. I had to carry the lot for a while inc all baby and child care. It's all a lot better but I've taken on more work and the last 4 weeks have been tough with exhaustion. I have had a whole year of bad sleep, starting with baby feeding and the stress of a wife loosing it every night until the drugs worked. Got loads of exciting things going on but to be honest I can't do them all and the responsibility to my family means all the personally exciting stuff I have to decline on. This has pissed me off a bit.

Kryton - best of luck for 2014 and I hope you find the answers. As a first step, write down your top 5 NY resolutions and then cross 4 of them out. Relax, simplify things, turn any electronic devices off and give yourself a break. Not easy I know but best of British!!!!

Thanks everyone so far, I'm sure this thread will be of help for others too. There's a fair bit of material there and despite being sceptical of anything "spiritual" I was drawn to and have ordered The Power of Know.

It sounds like you are your own harshest critic and maybe that's the key?

I think this might be true chakaping, I have a very negative view of myself as seen through others eyes, and also am intolerant to my own failure. A good example of this is the pressures of Racing as mentioned already - today's Turbo session was rubbish and I mentally chastised myself for the failure to complete more than 3 of the same nine intervals I completed last Friday - despite knowing I'm on a comedown from a family emergency involving my daughter and therefore tired from stress and lack of sleep. AND knowing that at 41 I'm about to start my first Cat 4 road races ever, so I can't possibly expect to be winning or even placing high, yet I am pushing myself hard, yet I believe not hard enough.

And so it goes on through life, decorating not achieved fast enough, back garden a tangled mess I could go on....

I've made a start though - as THM suggests I turned off my phone for Christmas and Boxing day for the first time ever, and today said "no" to some urgent work I was asked to do, due to my family issues. I know that makes life difficult for someone else and its not like me to say no but hey.

Know where you're coming from, OP. One thing thatz I've found really helpful is to carry a notebook, and whenever I feel like my head's starting to boil is to make a list of everything I'm stressing about. Then pause for a few minutes before looking at the list again. Just venting onto paper seems to help. More importantly, I usually realise I've been stressing over nothing very much.
Oh, and Steve Peters +1.